Reflection on my first lesson taught

Last week I taught my first real lesson. All my other lessons I taught have been to a group of my peers. I used my prior observations and knowledge of my students helped me to develop my lesson plans. The third grade class I am observing is completing unpredictable. I have observed them comprehend an entire math lesson on Roman Numerals in half a class period and then the next day take almost three days to learn how to read a thermometer. I knew my lesson plans had to be flexible enough to accommodate either scenario. I prepared a couple pages of extra problems on overhead slides in case they needed additional help. I also went ahead and previewed the next section in their books so I would be prepared to introduce if I had extra time. Part of my preparations also included making sure I knew every child’s name. I had the teacher help me make a seating chart and after two days I had them all memorized. The children thought it was really cool that I took the time to do this. This definitely helped establish my credibility with the students at the opening of my lesson when I called on them all by name. The students were very excited when I announced I was going to be teaching them today.
The students at Providence St. Mel are taught in an extremely structured and strict environment. Sometimes towards the end of the day I have observed that their attention spans and behavior become less then exemplary. Since I am teaching a math lesson towards the end of the day, I decided that I would need to try and engage the students as much as possible to keep their attention. I was constantly moving throughout the classroom. I used the overhead in the front for part of the lesson and then used the side board for another part of the lesson. I was always asking them to raise their hands to answer questions or come up to the board and show the class their work. I asked some open ended questions to the student’s about they arrived at their answers. I didn’t expect for them to have so many different answers. More then half the hands in the class went up. I didn’t know how to stop calling on students and move on. I wanted them all to have a chance to share but to a point. They were so busy thinking of what they were going to say they weren’t listening to those talking. I talked to the teacher about this and she told me about, one, two, three, back to me. She picks the three children that she is going to call on, so the rest can put their hands down and pay attention. I thought this was a great idea.
I made sure never to lecture for long without student interaction. I didn’t want to risk losing the students attention. I called on volunteers to come up to the front of class and hold up objects as examples. This worked very well because all the children wanted to volunteer and you couldn’t get picked it you weren’t on task. Everything ran exactly as I had planned until we started working in groups.
I differentiated the lesson by having the students work in their math groups. The groups are based on ability. All the groups were given a similar worksheet but the numbers and working were modified slightly. Some were slightly harder and some were a bit simpler. Since there are no programs for children with special needs at the school the teachers have to find a way to accommodate everyone’s learning styles and ability. This allowed me more time to work with the lower ability children, while the higher ability children were kept busy longer with more challenging work. My cooperating teacher had my gear my problems and worksheets to the average student (majority of the class) and then helped me to accommodate the higher and lower ability groups. This was a successful and unsuccessful at the same time. The work I gave the groups was successful but I had d hard time keeping them on task. I was a new teacher and they were seeing what my boundaries were and what they could get away with. They viewed me as the nice lady that would come into their classrooms and help them and who never yelled at them, like their teachers did. They thought they could take advantage of me. They kept breaking their pencils on purpose so they couldn’t do their work and they wouldn’t get to get up and sharpen them. It was very clear that this was on purpose. So I gave them a warning that no else could get up to sharpen their pencils and if a student’s pencil broke then they would have to hand in their work as in and incomplete. They realized I was serious and stopped. I quickly understood why the teachers are so tough on these kids. I am in a rough area in the city and if you give these kids an inch they take a mile. Next time I am placed in the classroom I need to make sure the students see more as the authority figure.
My closing did not go as planned either. I was running short on time, so I let the children know they had five minutes left to finish up their group work. I had each group come up at the same time instead of individually to put their problem on the board. It wasn’t too big of a deal but I didn’t feel more rushed then I would like too. I quickly previewed tomorrow’s lesson and collected their work. Next time I will try and use better time management skills during the lesson.
After the lesson I took the rubric and the class list and started accessing how the students performed and recorded points in the teacher’s grade book. Several of the children were not on task during the group activates and lost points on that section of the rubric. A few of the students of work was barely legible but for the most part I was very impressed with the work they turned in. They really seemed to grasp the material better than I expected. All the students grasped the main objectives of today’s lessons. I just need to address behavioral and organizational (neatness issues) I realized from observing them today that will have no problem with the next lesson, skip counting. Most of them were skip counting in today’s lesson, without realizing it. I would set my goals high for next class period and plan on covering 4.2 and I would prepare to start teaching 4.3 as well.
Overall, I think the lesson went pretty well and was definitely a learning experience. This was the first lesson I ever taught in a real classroom. All my other lessons that I have taught have been to a classroom of my peers. It was great to be able to teach to a real audience and get my cooperating teachers feedback. I will definitely remember this experience and build on it